Midnight Marauders (OU)

[Midniiight]

Hey, I recently found this site and have started playing on shoddybattle. After a little under a week I've decided to try to improve the team that I haphazardly slapped together a couple days ago. So here they are...

The Lead​

Metagross@Occa Berry
Ability: Clear Body
Ev's: 252 Hp / 236 Atk / 12 Def / 8 Spd
Adamant Nature
Stealth Rock
Earthquake
Bullet Punch
Explosion​

Metagross's job is to set up SR and KO the opponents lead or first switch in. EQ+Occa Berry+ BP allows me to kill Heatrans and Infernapes that think they have an advantage. BP hurts Aerodactyl into switching. Swampert gets exploded on as does Gyrarados that switches in and trys to set up DD. He's not meant to last long and I'm quick to blow him up. Struggles throughout the game if Rotom is present.​

Wet Vac​

Kingdra@Leftovers
Ability: Sniper
EV's: 24 SpD / 252 Atk / 232 Spd
Adamant Nature
Waterfall
Outrage
Substitute
Dragon Dance​

A set up physical sweeper. Both attack moves have STAB obviously, and the dragon dance allows Kingdra to tear through 1-2 pokemon quickly. Waterfall works wonders with flinch rate coupled with a DD. Outrage is generally reserved for when I'm set up already and they send in a water resister or an opposing dragon.​

Vengeful Killer​

Scizor@Choice Band
Ability: Technician
EV's: 200HP / 252 Atk / 44 SpD / 12 Spd
Adamant Nature
U-Turn
Bullet Punch
Superpower
Pursuit​

Scizor is an old favorite from my Gold version. Sadly this is the extremely typical CB variant, so I have almost nothing original to say about it. U-Turn is for grass/psychic pokemon and when I'm not sure whats coming out in a switch. Bullet Punch destroys pretty much anything that doesn't resist. Superpower for steels, waters, and electrics. Pursuit is for fleeing psychics and ghosts. Scizor also acts as my last ditch, lategame sweeper with Bullet Punch against weakened teams.​

Blazing Ape​

Infernape@Life Orb
Ability: Blaze
EV's: 252 SpA / 64 Atk / 192 Spd
Naive Nature
Nasty Plot
Close Combat
Flamethrower
Grass Knot​

Infernape has good speed and attack for quick damage before his lackluster defenses and Hp are exploited. I chose Naive nature to make sure I outran everything I possibly could. Nasty Plot sets up for sweeps. CC and Flamethrower are for STAB moves. Switched to Grass Knot because it allowed me to more damage to bulky grounds and waters, and especially Swampert who I had no answer for other than Explosion with Metagross.​

Trickster​

Gengar@Life Orb
Ability: Levitate
EV's: 92 Atk / 252 Spd / 166 SpA
Timid Nature
Shadow Ball
Thunderbolt
Focus Blast
Explosion​

Gengar took the place of Alakazam after I got absolutely destroyed by EQ Gyarados and Charizards enough times. His Levitate ability was much welcomed and he could do many of the same things as Alakazam. Timid nature again is for extra speed. Explosion was added over trick and I switched to Life Orb for less switching in, 92 Atk EV's are for extra damage with Explosion. Focus Blast is a necessary evil in my opinion for Blissey and Snorlax. Thunderbolt helps my team deal with water pokemon and was needed because of things like Skarmory and Gyarados.​

Jesus Christ​

Tyranitar@Babiri Berry
Ability: Sand Stream
EV's: 6 Hp / 252 Atk / 252 Spd
Jolly Nature
Dragon Dance
Crunch
Stone Edge
Fire Punch​

All time favorite pokemon. DDTar has gotten me several 3-4 pokemon sweeps and won me the game. Max speed and attack EV's and Jolly nature gets him off the blocks fast. After a DD few things have outran him without priority in my limited experience. My main attack with him is Crunch. Stone Edge is STAB rock, but rarely gets use because of horrible accuracy. Most importantly, Babiri Berry+Fire Punch kills Scizor that comes in thinking to scare away my sweep with Bullet Punch. After the bug gets burned, I rarely get stopped with DDTar. Admittedly, he can't kill bulky things like Swampert and Hippowdon.​

So there is my current OU team. Constructive criticism is happily accepted, but I will probably argue to get a better understanding of why your suggestion is useful. Please bear with me. Thanks in advance for any and all help.​

Red Font = Things I have changed since I've started.​

 

[mc2094]

Rain Dance isn't really that useful on Kingdra unless if it's on a rain dance team or is a mixed sweeper. I would replace it with sub. Replace leftovers with lum berry as it will allow you to switch into status, sub up and then procede to set up. It can also allow an extra round of outrage.

change scizor to the following:

Scizor@CB
200 HP/ 252 Atk/ 56 SDef
Adamant
-BP
-U-turn
-Superpower
-Pursuit

Extra EVs in SDef let it do better at trap killing latias. Brick Break will not always manage to OHKO blissey with 252 HP/Def Bold while superpower does. It also does more damage to steels. If you think logically, brick break will get a hit, then your opponent sends in a resist and forces a switch. Superpower gets a KO with a higher chance at that, opponent sends out a resist and forces a switch. Brick break should only be considered on SD variants as they need to stay in to sweep. CBScizor is meant to come in, get a kill or scout then switch out. How many times have you swept with brick break? Unless dual screen rises in usage I wouldn't even think about using BB. SDnape is just bad imo. With so many scarfed ground users and a whole mess of priority, even standard mixape has trouble doing what it was able to do best: outspeed and KO. As for mence, who would send it out against an Infernape. The common Nape runs HP Ice and OHKOs with it. The only Mence that would switch in is Scarf I guess. The fact that you can hit Gyara is true but overall, Mixape is a better set.

Gengar is good but a choice gengar locked onto Shadowball is easy picking for a CBscizor, CBttar and CBWeavile. Normally this isn't such a big issue but the fact that you lack any other special attacker makes it a pretty big deal. You don't have any other revenge killers so I suppose you can just try to be a bit more careful. If it's dying too quick, you can always use Rotom-H. A bit better coverage with overheat and can serve as a scizor counter. GL

 

[Midniiight]

If I'm changing Kingdra's Rain Dance to Substitute, should I change his ability to Sniper? And if SDInfernape is so bad, does any1 have suggestions for improvement or replacement?

 

[MegaKick]

Gengar is your only speciel attacker. Tyranitar fills the same role as kingdra, therefore, I suggest you replace him for latias, this gives you another speciel attacker and helps your infernape problems

 

[thechocolatebunny]

I don't really think scizor fits well with this team. This is a pure offensive team and a choice user with as many resisted attacks or pursuit just won't work that well. For example, if gyrados comes in on any of scizor's attacks (even u-turn if they used something as death fodder) than it can 6-0. Teams that use double dragon and cause scizor to use bullet punchcan take advantage of this pretty easily. If you still want this than you should probably scarf gengar to revenge kill salamence, gyrados, and the like, however scarfing it would basically have it doing what scizor is supposed to do so you could replace it.

This team is just very weak to gyrados and scizor is just set up fodder for it. A double priority SD lucario can also set up on scizor and cause problems.

 

[Midniiight]

Sizable updates to 4 out of 6 team members. So far I have ignored achocolatebunny's critique on Scizor only because I am reluctant to cut a favorite pokemon. Suggestions and overall advice still much needed and appreciated.

P.S If I were to get rid of Scizor, who would replace on this more or less "Offensive" team.?

 

[zarator]

Unless you badly need Bullet Punch, why not going for Flygon over Scizor? With a Scarf attached it makes a great scout - which is always nice to offesnive teams. U-Turn gives you the momentum you need, and Outrage can easily pick off a weakened team lategame. Moreover it has a nice array of resistances.

Just my 2 cents